It was a busy, violent weekend for right-wing nuts in America. But will the US media dare call them “terrorists”?

First, you had the Sovereign Nation shootout plus explosives outside the courthouse in Forsyth, Georgia. I’ll let the great Charles P. Pierce take it from here:

Let’s not kid ourselves. [Georgia shooter Dennis Marx] is a product of more than his own psychoses. He is a product of a conservative movement that has lost its moral bearings, a gun culture than imbibes paranoia the way some people drink iced tea, a media infrastructure—from Roger Ailes’s empire through the poison from which Clear Channel and other media conglomerate profit, all the way down to the guys broadcasting on short-wave from their root cellars in upper Michigan—that enables and encourages and empowers armed political paranoia and does so for the cheapest possible reasons, for political power and for corporate profit. And, no, Both Sides do not do this. There is nothing comparable on the Left to the vast ideological bunker of the mind that has been created and sustained by the institutions of modern conservatism within which Dennis Marx found a home. In a week in which Bowe Bergdahl has been slandered for cheap points and cheaper laughs, the emergence (once again) of an actual American terrorist should be a very sobering moment.

Then we have the Bundy-loving, Gadsden flag-draping Loonie and Clyde cop killers out in Vegas yesterday. From the major Las Vegas newspaper:

The shooters then stripped the officers of their weapons and ammunition and badges, according to a law enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation. They then covered the officers with something that featured the Gadsden flag, a yellow banner with a coiled snake above the words, “Don’t tread on Me.”

The flag is named for Christopher Gadsden, a Revolutionary War general who designed it. It has recently come back in vogue as an adopted symbol of the American tea party movement….

Like many of the neighbors contacted, Krista Koch said she didn’t know the couple’s last names. She described them as “militant.” They talked about planning to kill police officers, “going underground” and not coming out until the time was right to kill.

Brandon Monroe, 22, has lived in the complex for about two weeks. He said the man who lived in the apartment that was being searched often rambled about conspiracy theories. He often wore camouflage or dressed as Peter Pan to work as a Fremont Street Experience street performer. A woman lived with him, Monroe said, but he didn’t see her as often.

They were weird people, Monroe said, adding that he thought the couple used methamphetamines.

The man told Monroe he had been kicked off Cliven Bundy’s ranch 80 miles northeast of Las Vegas while people from throughout the U.S. gathered there in protest of a Bureau of Land Management roundup of Bundy’s cattle.

Reached Sunday, the rancher’s wife, Carol Bundy, said the shooting and the April standoff against the federal government were not linked.

In a later report, CNN naturally refuses to ID them as right-wing nuts, leaving vague that they left behind a “flag” and manifesto. Just hated cops. ABC does better, mentioning swastika symbols found at apartment and so on.

Greg MitchellTwitter Greg Mitchell writes a daily blog for The Nation focusing on media, politics and culture. He is the former editor of Editor & Publisher and author of thirteen books. His latest book, on the 2012 Obama-Romney race, is Tricks, Lies, and Videotape. His other books include Atomic Cover-Up, The Campaign of the Century (winner of the Goldsmith Book Prize), two books related to WikiLeaks and a pair of books with Robert Jay Lifton on Hiroshima and the death penalty in America. His Twitter feed is @GregMitch and he can be reached at: epic1934@aol.com. His personal blog is Pressing Issues.